A Fable for a Broken Girl
by Veradon Chimera
Summary: Remnant is full of legends and stories. Some of them true, some made up. But it is the effect that they have on the reader which makes them living...


Spoiler Warnings: spoilers up to the end of Volume 3 of RWBY and for the entirety of Gurren Lagann.

xXxXx

 **A Fable for a Broken Girl**

Yang Xiao Long could no longer tell how long she had lain there.

Not one that she perceived it as a problem. It was just an acknowledgement that she could no longer count the days since she had woken up in her bed. Instead, she had spent that time watching as everything disappeared out of her life.

First was her right arm. Hand, lower arm, elbow; all removed with one motion. It was no longer part of her being, no longer her... Just some lump of flesh and bone lying somewhere amidst the ruins of Beacon, wearing on it one half of Ember Celica. Yang frowned, turning her attention to its sister sitting on her bedside table. It was likely that they would never be together again.

Speaking of separated sisters: Ruby had disappeared. Well, not disappeared exactly... She'd left a left a note, but that note was the only link to where she was now. She'd said nothing beforehand, not to their Dad and definitely not to her.

That hurt Yang more than she thought. Sure, she had told Ruby to do what she wanted, but it had been over a month since she said that. Shouldn't had come to her, she have let her know what she was planning? Did her own sister now see her as so useless without her arm that she couldn't even be trusted with a secret? Closed out because she could no longer be a Huntress?

And then there was Blake. Even so long after the fact, she still couldn't seem to come to a decision on how she felt towards her. Depending on the day, she gyrated between self-righteous anger and... the simple question 'why'? Why did she run? Blake wasn't a coward. Yang had never believed that opinion Blake held of herself... the one that she had opened up to her about that night of the dance. She had only ever been strong by their side. Quite possibly even over eager!

Yet, she was gone now. Not in the fires of combat, but the aftermath where she needed her just as much...

Even the window right beside her bed, looking out onto the rest of the world, was now out of her reach by that thin layer of glass. She felt like the world was rejecting her. Leaving her behind with the dead.

So when Qrow came in one day saying he was heading out, she wasn't the slightest bit phased by it. He didn't say much, just what he needed to. What she now wished Ruby had... However, there was one oddity about this visit, even for Qrow. Especially for Qrow.

When he stood up to leave, he placed a book on her nightstand, half-leaning on the remaining gauntlet of Ember Celica.

"There," he said, "Something to keep you entertained until we all get back." He then turned and left, leaving Yang bewildered. She had never been any kind of keen reader, her attention span suited more to articles than novels and he was well aware of it. In fact, it was a trait he shared with her. So it strange that he was gifting her with books now.

She didn't dwell on it long after that. Leaving him to make his final preparations, she let it sink from her mind and returned to the same rut of thoughts she had already gone over and over before.

xXxXx

A week passed by, possibly two, before she gave it another thought. Even then it was purely chance that it even happened.

During the darkest morning in the depths of winter, she reached for Ember Celica and her hand instead picked up the book. Instead of putting it down, she began inspecting the old book, making several notes; cracked leather enveloped the pages, barely of any marking which would identify it, no name, no author, nothing.

Curious now, Yang placed it on her lap and leafed to the title page.

 _The Legend of Simon the Digger_

Yang raised an eyebrow. She recognised it. Or, at least, recognised the name. It was a nearly forgotten creation myth, even older than man's discovery of Dust. Where she heard of it, she could remember—probably mentioned in passing somewhere—but all she really knew of it was that some faunus had a particular problem with it.

Opening the first page, she quickly experienced for the first time being sucked into a book. She barely felt it, reading a couple of pages at a time at first before putting it down with the intent of leaving it to rest for good. What she hadn't accounts for was how it drew her back. Before long, she was following the journey of Kamina and Simon uninterrupted.

She watched as they rose out from the dust that man had come from and fought against the faunus armies that kept mankind underground. Her heart pounded as they stole the gunmen golem Gurren and discovered that they could use their aura to power the machines. And when Kamina made a rival of the faunus lieutenant Viral, it soared triumphed over him again and again.

" _Who the hell do you think I am?_ "

Yang threw herself mind and soul into their world; urging them and their crew—Team Dai-Gurren—along, sharing their victories and admiring this unbreakable man along Simon.

Then the unthinkable happened. During Team Dai-Gurren's first big battle, without any warning, the unthinkable happened. Kamina died.

" _Later... buddy..._ "

Nothing had prepared her for those words. And they hit harder than she thought.

From the moment she read them, tears rolled down her cheeks. She tried to hold herself together, but after ... everything! Mountain Glenn, what happened to Mercury's leg, her arm, Penny and Pyrrha, Blake leaving, her pushing Ruby away! So much had happened to her in so short a time, that all it took was this tragedy in a place she felt safe to open the floodgates. She bawled crying. Months of staying strong all fell away at once, leaving her to wail her lungs out.

She was so loud that her dad even rushed in, axe in hand ready to face whatever was in there. When he found just his daughter alone and in distress though, the axe was dropped and strong arms were wrapped around his crying girl.

"I'm here, sunshine," he cooed, rubbing circles on her back.

They stayed like that for a while and for the first time in years Yang took comfort in her father's presence. There wasn't any shame in crying in front of him like this. Only when at last her cries had fallen to hiccupped sobs, did Taiyang pulled back.

"There. Any better now?" she asked, sitting back but keeping one hand on her shoulder. "You can talk to me if you want."

Yang was glad she was already red-faced. Having to admit it was a story that had reduced her to that state was not something she took any pride in admitting. She didn't have to, fortunately, as her father followed her gaze to the book which had fallen off to the side, still open on the page which had stopped her.

"Ah, that explains it," he said, picking it up and skimming through the scene he knew only too well. "Your mom always loved this story. 'Said there was never anything else quite like it. Let me guess? The bit with Kamina, right?"

Yang barely heard the second half of this however, so struck was she by the revelation. Summer had read this? And she liked it?

For several seconds, she sat there waiting for her father to continue and it was only after a noticeable silence that it registered with her he had asked her a question.

"Yeah... Yeah, I was reading the bit with Kamina... but it's everything, really." She sighed heavily and ran her hand through her hair. "All the shit that happened at the tournament. Penny, Pyrrha... This." At this remark, she waved her stump at her Dad. "And they're just my problems. There's a whole other list of problems that the whole world has to deal with. Beacon, Vale..." She stopped, trying to find her point again. "I suppose I'm just wondering... Is there anywhere that we can even start from anymore? And if there is, where the hell is it?"

A warm, but sad, smile crossed his face as she asked this. He looked powerless, willing to help but with no way to. Yang didn't like it. It made her feel guilty. She turned back to her window view to avoid looking at him, but he still had something to say.

"As much as I wish I could, I don't have any of those answers," her dad answered, choosing his words deliberately, "But, the fact that you're asking those questions means you're doing better now than you were a few months ago." She turned back to him, though she didn't need to say anything; her look was her question. "Now you're looking for hope. After that, you just need two things. First, a good home and good food. And call me vain, but I think I've been doing a good job with that for years."

Yang smiled at this. It was small... weak, but it was the first any of them had coaxed from her months. "What the second?" she asked.

Leaning over her, he planted a kiss on her golden crown and smiled.

"Time."

xXxXx

She didn't pick it up again for a day. Instead, she wondered what her Uncle Qrow had been getting at in giving her this book. Why would he do this to her? Give her a book that would only break her heart again? But then, her mom had loved it. What was with that? Surely, there must be something in it to evoke such a feeling. And as he dad had said, she was looking for hope...

In the end, she once more found herself with the book in her lap, leafing through to the point which had broken her.

The story kept going. Of course it did. The rest of Team Dai-Gurren moved onwards, but Simon couldn't. He'd fallen there, unable to move on. It was only now with Kamina gone that Yang noticed the younger boy. The loss had crippled him, for a time robbing away any means of moving forward. But eventually he found a way, in his friends, in the young woman Nia who believed in him when he couldn't, and in the memory of his blood-brother. For all these things, he stood up again and kept going.

His will became his aura, giving him an intense strength and it brought Team Dai-Gurren to the doorstep of the Spiral King, the human who made the faunus and had the strongest aura of anyone alive. After a long and harsh battle, Simon managed to overcome him.

Then when a dark force stole away Simon's beloved, Nia, and the moon began to fall on the earth, Simon with his old enemy Viral flew to it and partially shattered it into the shape Yang knew it as today in order to get to and control the spaceship inside that was pulling it down to earth.

And their aura just continued to spiral ever upwards, towards the heavens until they stood opposed to the Progenitor of Grimm. This enemy too they fought and defeated.

" _Who the hell do you think we are!_ "

And all the while, Simon's semblances got more and more ridiculous. By the end, the story had inferred that his semblance was controlling reality! It was absurd! And Yang loved every minute of it! They were only slowed, never stopped. Even in the darkest hour, Simon and his friends never gave up.

And yet... they didn't win. Well they did _win_ , but the objective they journeyed into the cosmos for—to rescue Nia—they didn't quite achieve. Her life force was linked to the Progenitor of Grimm, so when it was defeated, she too faded from existence.

At first, Yang could only see it as a kick in the gut. A denial of everything they had fought for. Yet, like with Kamina, Team Dai-Gurran didn't falter even though it was the end of the book.

By time she'd turned the last page, she was emotionally wrung out. The moment she put it down, her head immediately hit the pillow and she had the first wholesome sleep she'd had in months. Her dreams were vivid, filled wilful people overcoming against the odds.

But when she woke, she couldn't help but let one part gnaw at her. Nia. Why did she have to die? Simon had defied the very universe in order to find her and... their happy ending was stolen away at the last moment. But even this blatant unfairness didn't stop them. They did grieve, but then took her memory into their hearts, and kept moving forward.

For days after, she contemplated that. She liked the book so much, but that ending just left a bad taste in her mouth. A stain on an otherwise perfect story...

It was only one morning as she looked into the bathroom mirror at herself that she realised why Qrow had given her that book. She looked a wreck. Her skin an unhealthy hue, bags under her eyes, hair a rat's nest. She _had_ given up. She had lost so much and had never gotten up from it.

But winning and losing wasn't the point, only to keep on going. That was the point of the legend. The end only highlighted that for her, achieving the greatest victory they could while suffering the worst failure. That was what Qrow was trying to show her.

She even had an example from her own life to draw from too. Ruby. She had shared in so much of the misfortune that Yang had, yet Ruby had still kept on going. Maybe she'd be impotent in the face of what she fought, she was still doing something. And Yang was surprised to realise she envied her for this.

So instead of returning to bed as she would have usually done, she turned the other way down the hall and went into the kitchen. Seating herself at her table place which hadn't seen her in months, she looked out that window. A new view, just as out of reach, but it was a shake up to her routine. That had to be good, right?

She was still sitting there when her dad came in, a bundle of kindling under each arm. On seeing her there, he smiled. "Sunshine, you're up." Yang managed a weak smile back. "You want anything?"

"Naw, I'm fine." she said, turning back to her window. And she honestly was. She was happy to face a new day with that small victory.

Over the days, she relied more and more on these small victories. She took each day as it came, but always with the commitment that she wouldn't give up. She couldn't let everything she'd built back up to just crumble. She wouldn't.

Each new day, another new challenge: dress herself, make a sandwich, juggle. She'd lost an arm, so she was just going to have to beat people one-handed. One half of Ember Celica became Ember Celica.

Sure, she had a host of other issues to deal with; Blake, Penny and Pyrrha's death, her mother, Beacon. But she was going to build herself up day-by-day until, one day, she'd go after Ruby. Then she'd have the strength to face them all.

Yang no longer dwelled among the dead.

"Who the hell do you think I am?"

xXxXx

A/N: Just an idea for world welding. Obviously the Gurren Lagann narrative in this story is an AU, but they're so close that I think both their stories could exist in the world of Remnant.

Some of the writing I'll admit is clunky, but I could spend forever fine-tuning it so I just said I'd get it out now.

I see a lot of fics dealing with Yang lamenting the events of Volume 3, but since we're not going to to get a resolution until October at the earliest, I thought I might as well mix things up and give Yang a recovery fic instead. It'll have to do until canon gets around to doing it.


End file.
